Sharon's peace plans remain a mystery

JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Ariel Sharon formed a right-leaning coalition Monday that could dramatically curb the role of religion in Israel, but offers only the murkiest prospects of peace overtures toward the Palestinians.

In building the coalition, Sharon shunned two ultra-Orthodox parties, traditional allies of his Likud faction. Instead, on Monday he signed up the secularist Shinui Party, handing the key justice and interior ministries to politicians bent on fighting what they perceive as "religious coercion."

The broader question of how to end fighting with the Palestinians was relegated to the sidelines, reflecting many Israelis' despair of peacemaking after the 2001 collapse of peace talks and the 29-month grind of Palestinian terror attacks and tough Israeli military crackdowns.

Shinui leader Yosef Lapid, a pugnacious ex-journalist, supports Palestinian statehood in principle but considers the issue moot as long as Yasser Arafat, discredited among Israelis, remains the Palestinian leader.

'Painful concessions'

Sharon, a veteran hawk, says he is ready for unspecified "painful concessions" and some form of Palestinian statehood. But his ambivalence seems reflected in his choice for his other coalition ally -- the six-seat National Religious Party, an avid patron of Jewish settlement in the West Bank and Gaza.

The deal with the 15-seat Shinui gives Sharon the support of 61 of 120 members of parliament, the minimum needed. Although Sharon has another month to round out his coalition -- and the coalition deals Likud has signed are not legally binding -- he reportedly intends to present his government for Knesset approval this week.

The dovish Labor Party, which made renewed peacemaking the focus of its failed campaign for last month's election, seemed headed for the opposition, at least for the near term. In recent meetings with Labor leader Amram Mitzna, Sharon promised to pursue peace but refused to put it in writing, dooming hopes for an alliance.

"He (Sharon) keeps saying he is ready for painful concessions in the future, but no one knows if he is bluffing," said political analyst Hanan Crystal.

Sharon's representatives were also meeting with the far-right National Union, with prospects uncertain: representatives of the seven-seat party said that, unlike the NRP, they would demand an explicit promise that no Palestinian state would be established.

Coalition negotiators said the still-unpublished coalition guidelines are deliberately vague on the Palestinian issue, but NRP leader Effie Eitam said they would allow for "natural growth" of settlements, which would put Sharon on a collision course with the so-called Quartet of Mideast mediators -- the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia. The Quartet has formulated a three-stage "road map" to Palestinian statehood by 2005 that would include, among other things, a freeze of Jewish settlement construction.

"They (Israeli leaders) have sent the road map into the archives along with the Mitchell and Tenet understandings," said Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat, referring to other international plans meant to end the fighting.

Among Israelis, however, the focus was on prospects that the new government could redefine the deeply troubled relationship between the secular majority and ultra-Orthodox minority.

In Israel's fragmented society, the NRP represents observant Jews who are not ultra-Orthodox; its constituents serve in the army, unlike ultra-Orthodox men who get draft exemptions, dress in black garb and often shun work and modernity for frugal lives of dedicated Torah study, supported by government subsidies.

In the coalition agreement, Shinui was promised control of two key portfolios dealing with the role of religion in the state -- justice and interior. The Interior Ministry determines who is classified as a Jew in the population registry. The ultra-Orthodox Shas, which ran the ministry for years, adopted strict criteria and repeatedly denied citizenship to new immigrants with non-Jewish family members.